Indica May Clock Sales Of 60000 Units

Indica, the small hatchback from Tata Engineering in the passenger car section, may end the financial year with sales of around 60,000 cars compared to 43,811 cars last year.

Speaking at the inauguration of second dealership in the city, Rajiv Dube, vice president (commercial) of the passenger car business unit at Tata Engineering, said the company sold a record 7,365 Indica last month against 2959 cars in January 2001.

Indica sales for the first ten months was at 49,000. Tata Engineering's passenger car business unit sold 71,961 vehicles in the domestic market in 2000-01.

Dube said, with increased Indica sales, the company was confident of achieving a cash break-even position within the current financial year. Investments in Indica have been to the tune of around Rs 1,800 crore.

Tata Engineering also carved out a market share of 22 per cent in the small car segment against previous year's 17 per cent. Indica has grown at a 40 per cent and the company hopes to maintain the same growth rate this year.

The Indica project was expected to achieve cash break-even thanks to the current spurt in sales. This would bring to an end a long period of poor sales which had imposed a burden on the company's finances. The improved Indica variant, 'V2', was currently selling at more than twice the volumes of its predecessor.

Dube said Tata Engineering enjoyed a market share of 10.4 per cent in the overall car and utility vehicle market in the year ending March 2001, making it the third largest car company in India.

Dube said, "The company is well on its way to launch Tata Sedan towards the end of 2002, the name and price of which is yet to be finalised". Tata Sedan was unveiled at the auto expo in Delhi.